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It started off with a short fax from our American correspondents “Cheung
Hsia died in New York on 13 September leaving an Estate of
$400,000. Research needed in China. Are
you able to help?”
Cheung Hsia had died leaving a Will in which he gave a
quarter of his Estate to a Jewish congregation in New York,
the rest he left to his brother Ha Wan who lived in Tang
Gu Zhuang, Dalinggu, Jianggingtian, Zhejiang Province, People’s
Republic of China. The Will made provisions for Ha Wan’s
share to go to his descendants should he have predeceased
Cheung Hsia. The only other piece of information obtained
came from the death certificate: Cheung Hsia was born in
China on 19th June 1907.
At first glance a name, date of birth and an address is
as much information as international case manager Georges
Delarue could possibly want. The Zhejian Province is located
just south of Shanghai. However, the district name Jiangingtian
or Jian Ging Tian presented more difficulties. This combination
of letters had to be a transcription error as Ging could
not exist. Jian Qing Tian, however, is similar enough to
be the most likely spelling, and this exists as a district – which
seemed to confirm Georges’ thoughts.
Sadly, the village name of Tang Gu Zhuang and canton name
of Dalinggu did not appear on any of the extensive atlases
we were able to consult. Georges made some preliminary phone
calls to China, but to no avail. After obtaining the go-ahead
from our American correspondents, he went to China. Georges
arrived in Shanghai and before continuing his journey with
an interpreter, he made a follow up call to the police office
of the district of Jian Qing Tian to ask again if they could
locate the canton of Dalinggu. The police were still convinced
there was no such canton. A call to the local government
later gave the same response. The interpreter concluded that
there was no point in continuing the search: the address
must be incorrect. However, Georges wasn’t about to
give up so easily. The interpreter didn’t object, but
clearly thought this was going to be a wild-goose chase.
This photograph is for
illustration purposes only
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After a plane trip and what seemed like an eternity on
winding roads which had been built out of prefabricated concrete
slabs, they arrived in Jian Qing Tian. They had had to share
the road with lorries, tractors and bicycles. Every broken
down lorry brought everything to a standstill until it was
repaired. Once there, they headed for the police station – which
brought the same lack of answers as the previous day. Next
was a stop at the Governor’s office, which had a geographical
department. There a bureaucrat offered them all the registers
available. Patiently he listed all the cantons of the district,
but to no avail – nothing came close to sounding like
Danlinggu.
Back on the street, Georges was approached endlessly by
locals who were surprised to meet a foreigner in this particularly
non-touristy part of China. It was during one of these conversations
that an elderly man recalled having heard of the name of
Da Lin Gu. He couldn’t remember where at the time,
but later sent his son to inform Georges that he had remembered
it was an ancient Canton which had been divided in two. One
of the resulting Cantons was now called Ren Zhuang; he couldn’t
recall what the other was called.
Armed with this new knowledge, progress resumed when Georges
went to another governmental office. After two days of talking
to different ministers and bureaucrats Georges met one who
had heard of the village Tang Gu in Ren Zhuang. Luckily he
also knew that the head of the village lived locally and
not in the village itself. A meeting was arranged for the
following day.
The head of the village took great pleasure in meeting
Georges, but had confusing news. He announced that “the
person you are looking for died 10 years ago. You’ve
also mis-spelt his name. It’s Hsia Wan not Ha Wan” He
went on to explain that he had surviving children as well
as a sister. This was progress indeed, but how could we be
sure he was talking of the person we were looking for, especially
since the name was different? Proof was available when Georges
met the family. Cheung Hsia had left China for the States
when he was 18 years old, and had not stayed in touch with
his family. We were able to obtain a letter (still in its
original envelope!) the deceased Cheung Hsia had written
in New York to his brother where he had used the same address,
with the same mistakes, as he had on his Will. The Chinese
post office had taken two years to find out to whom to deliver
the letter, although it is remarkable that the post office
tried at all!
Our conversations with the family also cleared up the discrepancies
in family name. The deceased Mr Hsia, had written his brother’s
name using Chinese name order but also used the local pronunciation
of “Ha”, which is pronounced “Hsia” in
Mandarin. With all this and much more, we were able to prove
the link between the two brothers. The letter, detailed interview
notes of the family and our final report convinced the New
York court that the three children we had found were indeed
each entitled to a third of their father’s share – a
share which represented a fortune for villagers in rural
China.
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